


let the moonlight take the lid off your dreams

by brinnanza



Category: Stellar Firma (Podcast)
Genre: Anxiety, Gen, canon-typical references to emotional and physical abuse, look this is just David-7 Finally Has A Bed: the fic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-02-01
Updated: 2020-02-01
Packaged: 2021-02-27 20:54:55
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,097
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22502095
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/brinnanza/pseuds/brinnanza
Summary: Trexel won’t be back to bother him for another 23 hours at least, which is more than enough time for a good night’s sleep and then some, and David is just…exhausted. More so than he can remember being in his just over five weeks of existence. Dealing with Trexel is always tiring, even more so when there isn’t even a brief to stick to, and spending nearly 24 hours in the plumbing before that hadn’t helped. David just has to step through the doorway, cross the pod, and he can actually lie down, properly, not just onto the floor in order to squirm away from Trexel.
Comments: 13
Kudos: 132





	let the moonlight take the lid off your dreams

**Author's Note:**

> here's this I guess???? david 7 deserves the world or at least a strong, chiseled chest upon which to lay his head. title's from ben folds' lullabye

Backlit by the glow of the sleeping IMOGEN terminal, David stands in the doorway to the clone pod. _His_ clone pod - in the sense of intended use if not actual ownership. He’d seen it all earlier, of course, had gotten a good look at the bed when he’d had to drag Trexel out of it, but without Trexel here now to hover over his shoulder, he can really take it in. It’s spare, not nearly as nice as the furniture in the sales office. It reminds him a little of some pictures of jail cells he’d seen on IMOGEN, but it’s - it’s - 

There’s a _bed_.

Trexel won’t be back to bother him for another 23 hours at least, which is more than enough time for a good night’s sleep and then some, and David is just… _exhausted_. More so than he can remember being in his just over five weeks of existence. Dealing with Trexel is always tiring, even more so when there isn’t even a brief to stick to, and spending nearly 24 hours in the plumbing before that hadn’t helped. David just has to step through the doorway, cross the pod, and he can actually lie down, properly, not just onto the floor in order to squirm away from Trexel.

He lifts a foot. Puts it down. Lifts it again. Puts it down.

“IMOGEN?” he says. She beeps an acknowledgement. “Is this… real?”

“Roleplay Holovision Currently Offline,” IMOGEN responds.

“No, I know,” says David, turning away from the pod so he can address IMOGEN’s terminal directly. “I just mean… This is really… mine? It’s not some sort of joke that will disappear on me?”

“All Clone Pods, Including Furniture and Occupants, Are the Property of Stellar Firma LTD.” There’s a brief pause, and then, “Current Registered Occupant: ‘um, David-7?’”

“Right,” David says. ”Thanks.” He turns back to the pod, lifts a foot. Puts it down. “It’s just…” He blows out a breath and squares his shoulders. IMOGEN’s therapy module had stressed the importance of acknowledging non-productive thoughts in order to turn them into productive thoughts. “Usually whenever something good happens, something terrible happens immediately afterward to take it away again.” He frowns. “ _David’s Fact Cancelled_.”

“Sadness Detected; Security Alerted.”

David ignores that. It’s one of IMOGEN’s more common alerts when he’s alone in the dark, and he’s pretty sure Security is never going to actually show up. 

IMOGEN doesn’t continue, so David lets out a long, slow sigh. Is it better to have the memory when everything inevitably comes crashing down around his ears, or will he wish he’d never had it so he doesn’t know to miss it? He’s read a number of romance novels on IMOGEN; most of them having something to say about it being better to have loved and lost than never loved at all. It’s not exactly the same thing, but it’s not like he has any better frame of reference.

And… the bed _does_ look comfortable. Not that David has much to compare it to, but there had been some give when Trexel sat down earlier, and anyway, the alternative is yet another night sleeping upright in a chair.

Right. The pod probably won’t taze him. It is _meant_ for him after all - IMOGEN had said as much, and she wouldn’t lie to him. Probably. He hesitates for one moment longer, then screws up his courage and steps through the doorway. He squeezes his eyes shut preemptively with a wince.

Nothing happens.

He cracks one eye, still braced to be punished for something that isn’t his fault and over which he has absolutely no control, but it doesn’t come. “IMOGEN?” he calls again, and she beeps. “Is it okay if I lie down? Is that allowed?”

“IMOGEN Fact File: Beds, Purpose Of.”

David makes a face. “Hmph, sass detected,” he mutters. “Thanks, IMOGEN.”

IMOGEN beeps again. “Watch It, Buster.”

“Sorry, IMOGEN.” 

The bed is nestled inside a cubby in the wall, bedclothes tucked in neatly (though a bit rumpled from Trexel’s earlier incursion). David sits down gingerly and then bounces a little as the mattress gives beneath him. “Oh!” he says, eyes going wide. “Oh, that’s...” He lays back, stretching out a bit. It’s only barely bigger than his body, but it’s long enough and wide enough for him to lie on his back, which is far more than he can say of the chair. 

He holds himself stiffly for a moment, just in case, but eventually, his whole body goes limp and loose as he melts into the mattress. Tension he hadn’t even known he’d been holding seeps out of him until he’s boneless. Even his thoughts drift away, leaving him floating in some peaceful, hazy place. 

Board help him, it’s _glorious_. He imagines returning here after the day’s client meeting, imagines sinking down into this soft, quiet place where Trexel can’t harm him. It feels like nothing can harm him here, like tucked into this little nook is the only safe place there is.

And he could have had this the whole time. Were it not for Trexel’s incompetence and reckless (at best) disregard for David’s life, he could have had this the _whole time_ , could have had someplace to return to that wasn’t the same four walls of the design office, the same _chair_. Anger flairs up hot within him, and all the tension that had seeped out gets reabsorbed until he’s wound tight and aching with it. 

He clenches his fists by his sides, teeth gritted, something like a growl bubbling up in his throat. Trexel has spoiled every single passingly decent thing so far, has been the direct cause of almost every terrible thing. David’s only met three people in his life, and the one he’s forced to spend the most time with has nearly gotten him killed on far too many occasions to even count.

David won’t let Trexel ruin this too. IMOGEN had showed him some breathing exercises earlier, a way to dispel that molten fury that bubbles up within him. He concentrates on his breathing: if for seven, hold for seven, out for seven. In, and hold, and out.

It takes a long time, but eventually, his hands uncurl and his body relaxes. He doesn’t think about Trexel, doesn’t think about how he might die, doesn’t think of all that time he’d spent thinking his entire existence was to be confined to a single chair in a single room.

Instead, he counts his breaths, concentrates on the mattress beneath him, the steady background hum of the station, and eventually, he sleeps.


End file.
